Thursday, 17 July 2014

The ‘social cost of carbon’ (SCC) is the estimated cost of
the damage caused by each additional tonne of carbon dioxide (or its
equivalent) released into the atmosphere. In practical terms, it tells us how much money
we can save from avoided damages when we reduce each tonne of greenhouse gas
emissions.

The global divestment campaign has recently started to have
an influence in New Zealand too. While our universities do not have large
endowments like their US counterparts, other organisations, such as Westpac,
have been targeted by activists for supporting fossil-fuel-related ventures.
State-owned funds also have large investments in oil, gas and coal companies. While
these entities have actively divested from the nuclear industry in the past,
they seem unwilling to do the same for fossil fuels at present. Here, we look
at how New Zealand organisations, both government and commercial, are influenced
by the fossil fuel divestment debate, and how one New Zealand city is leading
by example.

About this Blog

What are New Zealand’s possible pathways toward a global low-emission future, and what important choices lie ahead? This blog creates a forum for sharing information and perspectives about the mitigation challenges that New Zealand faces, the assets that we have, the solutions that might be developed or adapted, the lessons we can learn from overseas and the experience that we can offer to other countries.

This blog is part of Motu's Low-Emission Future project. See our about page for more information on the blog and see here for more information about the project.

The posts and comments on this blog are the views of the specific author; they are not the views of the author's organisation, other contributors, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research, the programme's funders, or the New Zealand Climate Change Research Institute.